A Flame
by Consulting Shippers
Summary: Everyone gets a countdown that begins as soon as they're born for when they are to meet their soulmate. Jim Moriarty's is mutilated, scars warping and distorting the clock wielded by fate, but the numbers can still been seen when looked at from an angle, ticking down under the damaged skin and bringing him closer to his unwanted soulmate.


**Title:** _A Flame_.

 **Pairing/s:** Jim Moriarty/ Sebastian Moran.

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own Sherlock, that belongs to BBC. I am doing this for my own fun and not for profit in any way, shape or form.

 **Warning/s:** Self-harm; violence; gore; blood; soul marks; soulmates; soul mate count down.

 **Chapter/s:** One.

 **Word Count:** 629.

 **Summary:** Everyone gets a countdown that begins as soon as they're born for when they are to meet their soulmate. Jim Moriarty's is mutilated, scars warping and distorting the clock wielded by fate, but the numbers can still been seen when looked at from an angle, ticking down under the damaged skin and bringing him closer to his unwanted soulmate.

 **Author's Note:** First fic of 2017, never thought it would be a mormor. Or that my first soulmate fic would also be a mormor either. Or that I would actually write a mormor. So full of surprises with this one, hope you guys enjoy!

As soon as Jim Moriarty realised what a soulmate would represent – _weakness, vulnerability, a chip in the perfected armour he had built up, a weapon to bring him down_ – he tried to burn it off.

He got his hands on a cheap disposable lighter that was easy to steal from the smokers around the back of the school. The small device weighed heavily in his pocket with promise throughout that day.

The lighter took a while but eventually it brought forth a flame and Jim stared at it for a moment, his light breathing causing the flame to flicker slightly. Fire had always left him mesmerised.

Without taking his eyes off the little flame, he lowered it onto his wrist. He watched as the skin under the countdown reddened and blistered but never burning away. The skin kept regenerating and no matter how close Jim brought the flame to the mark, how long he kept it there, the mark remained. Pink and slightly raised but still there and still counting down.

 **OoO**

Jim's next attempt was to skin it. If the mark kept reforming then Jim would remove the base on which it grew on. With an empty house and a steak knife, Jim began to carve away atthe mark.

Blackness licked at the corner of his vision as pain curled around his wrist and engulfed his body but Jim gritted his teeth together and managed to slice the skin away, blood staining everything. Exhausted, sweaty and shaking, Jim examined the bloody patch.

He left the bathroom with a smashed bathroom mirror; glass embedded into his fist as his wrist slowly knitted the skin back together, creating jagged lines that bordered the countdown.

 **OoO**

Other attempts were made with the same results. Shooting it just left a fascinating starburst scar while acid created spidery threads. It got to the point where Jim knew the mark would heal itself but curiosity burned within him to see how it would. It became an idle experiment when things got too boring in the crime world.

The skin was now riddled with scars, wrapping and overlapping one another in a twisted web. The skin was so mutilated that the countdown could only be read at a certain angle. Jim tried to get it to the point where not even that angle could be seen but the mark was stubborn and continued to show it. Jim carved a line through it with scissors out of retaliation and began to wear gloves and long sleeves.

The soul mark continued to count down.

 **OoO**

"I should just shoot you on principal."

Jim unlatched the safety, driving the gun further into the underside of his soulmate's chin. Jim grinned in amusement when Sebastian Moran didn't instinctively move away but leant into the gun, digging it further in, all the while maintaining eye contact with Jim. He bared his teeth at Jim in what was shaping up to be a smirk with a sardonic flair.

"Be my guest."

There was nothing overly interesting about Sebastian Moran. A dishonourably charged soldier with a violent streak a mile wide and a need to rebel that not even the army could beat out. Had a death wish but with decent instincts. Pretty nifty with a gun. Different, but not _interesting_.

But the man was so clearly _bored_ , and that Jim understood.

Understood enough to remove the gun and let the man live another day, just to see how long he could make him dance, at least until Jim inevitably grew dull of the presence of his soulmate and disposed of him.

It never occurred to him that this man would cause something to flicker inside him, a small flame from a cheap lighter into one that could engulf the world.


End file.
